If you struggle with fixed or rigid ways of thinking and have a hard time managing repeated and recurrent thoughts and behaviors that get in the way of your quality of life, KAP can help you be able to form new ways of thinking, feeling and relating to your world.

Often our “negative” or undesired emotions get stuck in our heads and bodies and create automatic patterns of thinking and behaviors which keep us stuck, despite or efforts and desires to think and feel differently.

KAP uses a small dose of Ketamine (with a therapist present to guide and support your experience) to help loosen, rewire and shift the entrenched patterns in thinking and feelings by inducing a mild state of non-ordinary state of conciseness.

I’m glad you asked, and I want to bust some myths about Ketamine right before we go any further. Ketamine has a history of being used as a “club drug” but KAP is entirely different. There are a few crucial and important things to know about Ketamine and KAP.

• Ketamine and KAP have gone through rigorous clinical trials where the dosing levels, supportive techniques and clinical outcomes have been tested, studied and proved to be safe and effective. See the published articles here, here and here. Also take a look at the section summarizing clinical research and what it means here.
• The dosing of Ketamine used for KAP sessions is low and has been determined to be safe and effective based on clinical trials.
• The felt effects of Ketamine at the levels used for KAP is such that your experience of the medicine is not often longer than 90 minutes, with most people reporting about 35-45 minutes where they are feeling the full effects of the medicine.
• Due to the short duration time that Ketamine is felt by patients and the positive and long-lasting outcomes reported afterwards, it has been deemed a safe, effective and efficient treatment for anxiety and depression related disorders.

Ketamine is a medicine with psychedelic properties. What that means is when people take it, they experience a different state of awareness and consciousness.

Every person’s experience is different and there is not “one way” to feel and use the medicine. This is because it works specifically with your mind, your experiences and your own unique patterns of thinking, feeling and understanding the world.

Ketamine uses where you are and what is coming up for you by opening up a different way of perceiving yourself and your world. It does this by inducing a mild trance like, relaxed state with images and feelings that one does not often encounter in our conscious mind.  Some of the most common experiences patients report are feelings or warmth, being held and oneness with the universe. They often encounter visions like they were dreaming and being able to access difficult or painful memories and feelings with a felt sense of safety, belonging and self-love.  

Now this part gets me really excited so hang on while I geek out a bit about the brain.

To start we need to first understand the brain and what neuroplasticity is and what neurotransmitters are and why they are crucial to our mental, emotional and physical health.

Neuroplasticity is the brains ability to build, form and rebuild its neurological networks. This happens every day, every minute of each day and where the brain fires- it wires.

Imagine your brain as a forest or a mountain. Neuroplasticity is the forests ability to make new paths and “footprints” when a hiker goes off the well-travelled trail. The more often a trail is travelled, the wider and deeper the path becomes. Over time certain paths might be so well travelled that walking on them and finding your way becomes automatic.

Our thoughts, behaviors and reactions are the “hikers” of our minds. Walking along old paths and then finding new paths.  All of us are carrying a “backpack” of our past events and life experiences for some, it’s a light backpack and for others of us, It’s heavy backpack of traumatic events. The heavier the backpack, the deeper our footprints become on the path.

Over time a path might become well-worn and familiar (even if it is not desirable) it’s familiar and it becomes too scary or difficult to venture off that path and find a new way in the forest. We naturally resist the change in direction and can become stuck in the same old ways of thinking and relating to our world.

Thankfully- our when we start to feel, act, think and behave differently- new better paths begin to develop. When this happens, we can begin to access the change we want to see in our lives in easier and less threatening ways. The backpack becomes lighter as we unpack it, take new routes and grow more hopeful. This neuroplasticity of the brain is what Ketamine helps us access and use to grow and change.

Now- there is good news. Our brain’s capacity to change and create new neuro pathways is amazing, wonderful and accessible. That’s where neurotransmitters are crucially important and can shift us out of these ruts and into a new way of responding to our inner thoughts and feelings and experiences.

Ketamine works directly on the neurotransmitters that give the brain it’s plasticity- or its ability to grow, change and develop new ways of thinking.

A lot of us might know some of the more familiar neurotransmitters, serotonin (our mood stabilization center), dopamine (the CEO of the reward center) , oxytocin or (the pleasure queen) but I bet a lot of us have not thought much about glutamate but glutamate is key as to why Ketamine is an effective treatment for depression, anxiety and other internalized disorders.

For most of us the first line of treatment is using SSRI’s to treat depression and anxiety and they have proven benefits but most of us have not heard much about how glutamate works. Glutamate is the oil in the engine of our neural networks. It is responsible for passing along the message from one nerve cell to the other. It keeps the conversation going between all of our cells and it works great until it runs into a dead end or is blocked.

Glutamate- From the Cleveland Clinic;

“In your brain, glutamate is the most abundant excitatory neurotransmitter. An excitatory neurotransmitter excites or stimulates a nerve cell, making it more likely that the chemical message will continue to move from nerve cell to nerve cell and not be stopped. Glutamate is essential for proper brain function.”

These specific neurotransmitters are like the gas and oil in your engine and when all is going well, messages flow freely from one nerve cell to the other. When there are blocks rigid patterns or ways of thinking begin to develop and not all the messages get through. Ketamine works directly with glutamate which make up almost 80% of the neurotransmitters in our brain and helps not only flush the blocked pathways and messages but actually begins to form new synapses and pathways.

Ketamine directly impacts glutamate so when we activate these specific receptors, we are working directly with the agent, the receptor, of change in our brain and neural networks.

Imagine you have been trying to make changes and integrate new learnings into your life, but it seems the old patterns keep coming up and the message doesn’t get through.

 This is where Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy can be of great benefit in getting the new message through the blocks and help all your other neurotransmitters (dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin etc.) get through and be more effective in their role.

This happens both in our conscious and unconscious mind through KAP treatment.

In addition, the experience of using Ketamine produces a very pleasant, warm and safe feeling in our bodies and minds that allows us to imagine our lives in a different way of relating to ourselves. We can see our very best version of our self and also access uncomfortable feelings like grief, shame and traumatic events. It gives the opportunity to access the hard and unsettling feelings in a safe, kind and generous way.

So, it’s no wonder that it’s not easy for a lot of us to make the changes we want in our lives and even with our best efforts and intentions change can be slow and hard. As a therapist I have had the honor of working with some of the most brave, courageous and committed people to their own well-being and healing and it’s a big investment, both of time, money and energy and Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy provides an opportunity for the work to feel better and easier. It’s not a short cut or a miracle cure all but what it offers is a breakthrough based on where each person is and the work they have done.

If you haven’t done the work- then the benefits of KAP will be limited. If you have done the work and are committed to integrating the work- then Ketamine Assisted Therapy can be profoundly impactful and useful I your process and healing.

KAP is a treatment modality where the therapist has been trained to work specifically with Ketamine and Non-Ordinary States of Consciousness. That means the therapist will be both a support and guide for the patient from the start or preparation sessions, the dosing and the administration of the medicine and most importantly, the integration of the journey (or session) afterwards. Most KAP therapists have not only going through extensive training (over 40 hours) but also have done their own work using the medicine with other KAP therapists or programs.

Ketamine by itself is a powerful and effective medicine but without the support, training and integration of KAP and a KAP trained therapist, its benefits are short lived, and the potential gains are less.

Non Ordinary or Altered States of consciousness include various mental states in which the mind can be aware but is not in its usual wakeful condition, such as during hypnosis, meditation, hallucination, trance, and the dream stage.

NOSC’s offer a temporary departure from one’s typical ways of being, thinking, and doing. In this non-ordinary space, we have the opportunity to experience life through a different lens, and to disrupt unhelpful mental and emotional patterns. The brain awakens to a fuller awareness of what is possible, rather than adhering solely to what is familiar. In this sense, NOSCs hold tremendous potential for healing, creativity, and self-transformation.